Hi, I just bought Roland LEF-12i UV printer. I want to start printing on transparent cases, however, having issue with creating white layer.

1) I have vector pictures and I know that I should somehow to create white layer with swatch for each picture. Is any video tutorial for that?

2) As I understand, I need to create white layer in illustrator, then save as pdf and inport to versaworks RIP, then print. Am I right?

3) I was thinking about automation of process with actions in illustrator. I can create transparent table in illustrator according to dimensions of my jig. Then using actions I will be able to quickly place pictures to exact places for printing with jig. But when I save and import this table to versaworks, all pictures appear as separate ones and not like complete table. Do you have any idea how define contour of table in illustrator and import it to RIP?

4) Should I only use vector images? Is any way to convert simple jpeg or png files to vectors and then to use them for printing?

I would start by reading the user guides that came with the printer, especially the white user guide. This explains quite a bit of what you need to know. Its a very steep learning curve to begin with. Even on my demo day before purchase I got a lot of information I needed, and when my dealer installed it, it was a few odds and ends, and mostly about the maintenance.

1) I have vector pictures and I know that I should somehow to create white layer with swatch for each picture. Is any video tutorial for that?Select all of the elements that you want to have a white underlay and copy them. Paste in place on new layer and unite them with Pathfinder tools.

2) As I understand, I need to create white layer in illustrator, then save as pdf and inport to versaworks RIP, then print. Am I right?Yes. Or in VersaWorks you can use the Special Color tab to automatically generate white data from the file.

3) I was thinking about automation of process with actions in illustrator. I can create transparent table in illustrator according to dimensions of my jig. Then using actions I will be able to quickly place pictures to exact places for printing with jig. But when I save and import this table to versaworks, all pictures appear as separate ones and not like complete table. Do you have any idea how define contour of table in illustrator and import it to RIP?Are you creating separate artboards for each? If so it will export as multiple images/pages. Save as one single artboard as a pdf.

4) Should I only use vector images? Is any way to convert simple jpeg or png files to vectors and then to use them for printing?You can also use bitmap images, but not png...only jpeg or tiff.

Hello, made some initial prints, everything looks fine, however, there are few more issues:

1) White colour doesnt looks completely white, it has sight greyish hue. How to achieve nice white colour?
2) How to crop artworks in illustrator? I watched many tutorials. Using mask doesnt really crop an artwork, it just hides part of it. Is any way to completely crop them?
3) How do you prepare a media for printing. I noticed that even small dust can leave white dots on print. I try to keep insides very tidy but still pretty difficult to spot everything. Do you have a specific media preparation technique?